The Last Spike eBook

The Judge now produced his cigar case, and the General,
bowing to the young lady, followed the great financier
to the other end of the car, leaving Mary alone, for
they had seen Bradford coming up the track.

The dew of her sweet sorrow was still upon her face
when Bradford entered, but the sunshine of her smile
soon dried it up. The hands he reached for escaped
him. They were about his face; then their great
joy and the tears it brought blinded them, and the
wild beating of their happy hearts drowned their voices
so that they could neither see nor hear, and neither
has ever been able to say just what happened.

On the day following this happy meeting, when the
consolidated special was rolling east-ward, while
the Judge and the General smoked in the latter’s
car, the tent boy brought a telegram back to the happy
pair. It was delivered to Miss Manning, and she
read it aloud:

“Washington,
May 11, 1869.

“General G.M. Dodge:

“In common with millions I sat yesterday and
heard the mystic taps of the telegraph battery announce
the nailing of the last spike in the Great Pacific
Road. All honor to you, to Durant, to Jack and
Dan Casement, to Reed and the thousands of brave followers
who have wrought out this glorious problem, spite
of changes, storms, and even doubts of the incredulous,
and all the obstacles you have now happily surmounted!

“W.T.
Sherman,

“General.”

“Well!” she exclaimed, letting her hands
and the telegram fall in her lap, “he doesn’t
even mention my hero.”

“Oh, yes, he does, my dear,” said Bradford,
laughing. “I’m one of the ‘thousands
of brave followers.’”

Then they both laughed and forgot it, for they were
too happy to bother with trifles.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: The subsidy from the Government
was $16,000 a mile on the plains, and $48,000 a mile
in the mountains.]

THE BELLE OF ATHABASCA

Athabasca Belle did not burst upon Smith the Silent
all at once, like a rainbow or a sunrise in the desert.
He would never say she had been thrust upon him.
She was acquired, he said, in an unguarded moment.

The trouble began when Smith was pathfinding on the
upper Athabasca for the new transcontinental.
Among his other assets Smith had two camp kettles.
One was marked with the three initials of the new line,
which, at that time, existed only on writing material,
empty pots, and equally empty parliamentary perorations.
The other was not marked at all. It was the personal
property of Jaquis, who cooked for Smith and his outfit.
The Belle was a fine looking Cree—­tall,
strong, magnifique. Jaquis warmed to her
from the start, but the Belle was not for Jaquis, himself
a Siwash three to one. She scarcely looked at
him, and answered him only when he asked if she’d
encore the pork and beans. But she looked
at Smith. She would sit by the hour, her elbow
on her knee and her chin in her hand, watching him
wistfully, while he drew crazy, crooked lines or pictured
mountains with rivers running between them—­all
of which, from the Belle’s point of view, was
not only a waste of time, but had absolutely nothing
to do with the case.